Method and system for navigating a hard copy of a web page

ABSTRACT

This disclosure provides a method and system for navigating hard copies of web pages. According to one exemplary method, a hard copy of a web page is navigated by capturing with a mobile device an image of the hard copy, performing OCR on the captured image to identify the captured web page, accessing a database to retrieve a copy of the identified web page and displaying the retrieved copy of the identified web page along with active web page links on the mobile device.

BACKGROUND

The Internet, fueled by the popularity of the Web, has exhibitedsignificant growth over the past few years. At present, to access theinformation on the Web, users typically use standard computer equipment,such as a home personal computer with a display and modem, and anInternet connection.

There have been efforts to expand the number of users and the ease withwhich they access the Internet. For example, several companies havedeveloped television set-top boxes that permit users to browse or “surf”the Internet from their television sets. In addition, communicationcompanies have joined with software developers to allow mobilecommunication devices such as cellular telephones, pagers, smart phonesand personal digital assistants to access some features of the Internet.

Presently, several types of Internet connections are available. Forexample, to use an Internet connection from Internet Service Providers(ISPs), the user communicates with a computer at the ISP's facilityusing a modem and standard telephone line or broadband cable. The ISP'scomputer in turn provides the user with access to the Internet. Throughthis Internet connection, the user can access information on the Webusing a computer program called a “Web browser.” The Web browser is asoftware program that allows a user to view the data received from anInternet site location. To accomplish this, the user gives the Webbrowser a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) for an object on the Internet,for example, a data file containing information of interest. Thedocument is referred to as a “Web page,” and the information containedin the Web page is called content. Web pages often refer to other Webpages using “hypertext links”, also referred to as “hyper-links”, orsimply as “links”. The links are typically associated with words,phrases, or images representing the other pages in a form that gives thebrowser the URL for the corresponding Web page when the user selects alink.

Links are made possible by building Web pages using a Hypertext MarkupLanguage (HTML), an evolving markup language standard which is used toconstruct documents in a uniform, standardized format so they may beaccessed by Web browsers and displayed for the user. HTML is an ASCIItext-based markup language which defines page or frame formats used todisplay the HTML elements. To provide the hypertext linking, mostdocuments contain “anchor” words, phrases or images. The anchors serveas visible starting points for links. The anchor, or the HTML <A>element, includes a URL that uniquely identifies the endpoint of thelink, or the destination document or Web page that will be activatedwhen the link is selected.

Once the user selects a URL for a site either directly or through alink, the URL can be used to identify a specific host computer on theInternet called a “Web Server,” along with a location of the Web pagelocated on the Web Server. The Web browser retrieves the Web page anddisplays it for the user.

Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is a common network protocol used bythe browser to access and link users with various other Web pages orsites referenced by the original Web page. HTTP requires a programrunning on the host computer that understands and responds to theprotocol or formatting of the link's content. The file retrieved mightbe, for example, an HTML file, a graphics file, a sound file, aPowerPoint™ file, or a word processing file. Whether the file can beretrieved or handled depends on the features and capabilities of thebrowser.

When a browser requests a specific URL, it sends the request to the Webserver. The Web server receives the request and attempts to fill it.There are several ways the user requests can be filled. For example, Webservers can translate a request such as“http://www.recipes.com/recipes/soup.htm” into a search for a physicalfile on that server. It would start from the base category for thedomain and then apply the path that was requested. In this example, theWeb server would look for a category called “recipes” and then look fora file called “soup.htm” within that category. If the file was found itwould be passed back, without modification, to the requesting browser.In this way, the URL can be thought of as a specific file sitting on aserver, or host computer.

HTML can be translated from other standard generalized markup languages,such as Wireless Markup Language (WML). WML was developed by theWireless Application Protocol (WAP) Forum, which was founded byERICSSON®, MOTOROLA®, NOKIA® and UNWIRED PLANET®. WML was developed as aglobal wireless protocol specification intended for use in specifyingcontent and user interface for narrowband devices, including cellulartelephones and pagers, to allow users mobile access to the resources ofthe Internet. WML is based on XML (extensible Markup Language).

While computer terminals and other devices that are configured toreceive HTTP signals and HTML files may utilize the above methods toaccess and view internet data, sometimes a web page is printed as a hardcopy for display purposes or as a handout and the web page loses itscontrol information and cannot be navigated. For example, a conferenceorganizer may print web pages including the conference schedule anddistribute them to the attendees, and/or displayed on a poster. Once theconference schedule web page is printed, the web page loses its controlinformation and the viewers cannot navigate the web page.

This disclosure provides a method and system for navigating a hard copyof a web page.

INCORPORATION BY REFERENCE

U.S. Patent Publication No. 2004/0044747, published Mar. 4, 2004, byTrevor et al., entitled “Link Navigator Method And System For LocatingWeb Content”;

U.S. Patent Publication No. 2004/0049555, published Mar. 11, 2004, bySchilit et al., entitled “Service Portal For Links From Web Content”;

U.S. Patent Publication No. 2005/0185060, published Aug. 25, 2005, byNeven, S R., entitled “Image Base Inquiry System For Search Engines ForMobile Telephones With Integrated Camera”;

U.S. Patent Publication No. 2010/0250547, published Sep. 30, 2010, byGrefenstette et al., entitled “System For Automatically GeneratingQueries”;

U.S. Patent Publication No. 2011/0153653, published Jun. 23, 2011, byKing et al., entitled “Image Search Using Text-Based Elements Within TheContents Of Images”;

U.S. Pat. No. 7,962,128, issued Jun. 14, 2011, by Neven et al., entitled“Mobile Image-Based Information Retrieval System”;

U.S. Pat. No. 7,797,447, issued Sep. 14, 2010, by Schilit et al.,entitled “Data Detector For Creating Links From Web Content For MobileDevices”;

U.S. Pat. No. 7,751,805, issued Jul. 6, 2010, by Neven et al., entitled“Mobile Image-Based Information Retrieval System”;

U.S. Pat. No. 7,565,139, issued Jul. 21, 2009, by Neven, Sr. et al.,entitled “Image-Based Search Engine For Mobile Phones With Camera”;

U.S. Pat. No. 7,599,580, issued Oct. 6, 2009, by King et al., entitled“Capturing Text From Rendered Documents Using Supplemental Information”,are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION

In one embodiment of this disclosure, described is acomputer-implemented method of navigating a hard copy of a web pagecomprising A) a user capturing an image of a web page hard copy using acomputer device including an image capturing device, a display and auser interface; the captured image including one or more text stringswhich provide dormant links to other web pages; B) performing OCR(optical character recognition) on the captured image to produce a textsearchable version of the captured image; C) searching a database forone or more portions of text associated with the text searchable versionof the captured image, the database including text searchable versionsof a plurality of electronic copies of web pages retrieved from one ormore web servers including a copy of the web page hard copy, each textsearchable version of the plurality of electronic copies of web pagesincluding control information which links one or more text stringscontained in the plurality of electronic copies of web pages of otherlinked copies of web pages; D) retrieving the control informationassociated with the captured web page; and E) displaying on the computerdisplay a processed image of the web page hard copy, the processed imageincluding the retrieved control information associated with the web pagehard copy and the processed image includes an appearance of one or moretext strings associated with the web page hard copy which are linked toone or more other electronic copies of web pages retrieved from one ormore web servers, the appearance indicating the one or more text stringsare active.

In another embodiment of this disclosure, described is a web page hardcopy navigation system comprising a computer device including an imagecapturing device, a display and a user interface, the computer deviceconfigured to capture an image of a web page hard copy; a databaseoperatively connected to the computer device, the database configured tostore a plurality of web page electronic copies retrieved from one ormore web servers, the plurality of web page electronic copies includingcontrol information which links text strings contained in the web pageelectronic copies to other web page electronic copies; a serveroperatively connected to the computer device and the database, theserver configured to search the database for an electronic copy of acaptured image of a web page hard copy, retrieve the electronic copy ofthe web page hard copy associated with the captured image including anycontrol information, and communicating the retrieved electronic copy ofthe web page hard copy associated with the captured image to thecomputer device, the communicated retrieved electronic copy including aprocessed image of the web page hard copy, the processed image includingthe retrieved control information associated with the retrievedelectronic copy of the web page hard copy, the processed image includingan overlay on the captured image which modifies an appearance of one ormore text strings associated with the web page hard copy which arelinked to one or more other electronic copies of web pages indicatingthe one or more text strings are active.

In still another embodiment of this disclosure, described is a computerprogram product comprising a non-transitory computer-usable data carrierstoring instructions that, when executed by a computer, cause thecomputer to perform a method comprising: A) capturing an image of a webpage hard copy using a computer device including an image capturingdevice, a display and a user interface; the captured image including oneor more text strings which provide dormant links to other web pages; B)performing OCR (optical character recognition) on the captured image toproduce a text searchable version of the captured image; C) searching adatabase for one or more portions of text associated with the textsearchable version of the captured image, the database including textsearchable versions of a plurality of electronic copies of web pagesretrieved from one or more web servers including a copy of the web pagehard copy, each text searchable version of the plurality of electroniccopies of web pages including control information which links one ormore text strings contained in the plurality of electronic copies of webpages of other linked copies of web pages; D) retrieving the controlinformation associated with the captured web page; and E) displaying onthe computer display a processed image of the web page hard copy, theprocessed image including the retrieved control information associatedwith the web page hard copy and the processed image includes anappearance of one or more text strings associated with the web page hardcopy which are linked to one or more other electronic copies of webpages retrieved from one or more web servers, the appearance indicatingthe one or more text strings are active.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a system for navigating a hard copy of aweb page according to an exemplary embodiment of this disclosure.

FIG. 2 illustrates a captured image associated with a hard copy of a webpage according to an exemplary embodiment of this disclosure.

FIG. 3 illustrates the captured image of FIG. 2 with highlighted textassociated with linked web pages according to an exemplary embodiment ofthis disclosure.

FIG. 4 illustrates a retrieved web page associated with the highlightedtext of FIG. 3 according to an exemplary embodiment of this disclosure.

FIG. 5 is a flow chart of a computer-implemented method of navigating aweb page according to an exemplary embodiment of this disclosure.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of exemplary internal hardware associated witha computer, server, etc. that may be used to implement programinstructions.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

This disclosure provides an augmented reality method and system thatallows for real-time hardcopy navigation of a web page. The systemincludes five components: 1) a database, 2) digital camera, 3) searchengine, 4) scene generation engine, and 5) UI (user interface). Benefitsof the disclosed method and system include recreating functionaldocuments after printing in a realistic setting such as a conferencesetting. As previously discussed in the Background section, a web pagemay sometimes be printed as a hardcopy. For example, a conference mayprint its web pages about the conference schedule and distribute them tothe attendees. In addition, a web page containing a map of theconference site may be printed and displayed on a poster. Once it isprinted, the printed web pages lose their control information and cannotbe navigated.

With reference to FIG. 1, shown is a block diagram of an exemplarysystem to facilitate the operation of a method of navigating a hard copyof a web page.

The system includes a computer device 110 with a display, an imagecapturing device and a UI, for example, a mobile internet device such asa smart phone, laptop computer, etc. The computer device 110 isconfigured to capture an image of a web page hard copy 105. Othercomponents of the system include an application server 125, database ofstored web pages 120, a plurality of web servers 130, 135, 140 and 145,as well as an internet/intranet 115 which provides communications to andfrom the system components.

The application server 125 is configured to execute the computerinstructions necessary to process a captured image of a hard copy of aweb page, perform searching of the database 120 for a web pageassociated with the captured image, perform scene generation andcommunicating the generated scene to the computer device 110 for displayto a user.

Below is provided further detail of the disclosed method and system. Asstated above, the system includes five parts: a database that stores webpage information, a digital camera that captures images, a search enginethat retrieves the web information, a scene generation engine thatproduces artificial scenes simulating the experience of surfing the web,and a user interface that interacts with users. The database containsinformation for many web pages, including their controls (links, etc.)and text appearing in each page. According to one exemplary embodiment,the database is established and updated by crawling the web or a subsetof the web. When images of a hardcopy are captured by a camera, thesearch engine searches the database and retrieves the web pageassociated with the hardcopy. Using the information retrieved from theweb page, the scene generation engine is able to create artificialscenes that simulate web navigation experience according to a user'scommands.

To navigate a hard copy of the web page a user points his/her cameratowards the hardcopy of a web page, the system retrieves the web controlinformation and creates simulated scenes according to user's action. Forexample, if the user presses his/her finger (cursor) on a link in thehardcopy image located on the camera screen, the link becomes underlinedor changes color. If the user further activates the link, the web pageassociated with the link appears on the screen.

The user has the option to control how the new web page is presented.Option A is to have the associated web page appear in the device'snative browser. Option B is to have the page rendered as if it existedin the real world (same zoom, angle of view, white point, etc. as thatof the captured image of the web page) In terms of usability, Option Ais the suggested default.

The web search mainly relies on OCR (Optical Character Recognition). Thesearch engine first performs OCR on the captured image of the web pagehard copy, and then searches in the database using the OCR results askeywords. The web page stored in the database, whose text matches thekeywords with a certain degree of confidence, is considered to be thehit, and its HTML contents are retrieved. Ambiguity may exist that morethan one stored web page matches the keywords, particularly in the caseswhen captured image contains only a small portion of the text.Additional information from the captured image, such as picture andgraphics, the relative positions of the text, can be used for selectingthe right hit. The system can also suggest via a UI that the user zoomout to capture a larger portion of the web page. Alternatively, if thecaptured image is too low in resolution, which may result in low OCRaccuracy, the system can suggest that the user zoom in.

The scene generation engine works in two modes: 1) augmenting/modifyinga captured scene; and 2) creating a new scene. In the first mode, thescreen displays the scene of the web page hard copy captured, possiblywith a portion of it being modified. For example, FIG. 2) shows acropped portion of a captured scene, and in FIG. 3), the link “FeaturedOral Presentation #3—Ubiquitous Computing for Business” changes itscolor on the screen as a pointing finger moves over it (note: finger notshown). The second mode is used when an entire scene needs to beartificially generated, for example in the cases when a user navigatesto a new web page. In both modes, it is preferable that a scene, or themodification of the scene, is generated in a natural manner. In thefirst mode, the modifications produced are consistent with itssurroundings in shape, dimension, color, and other imaging attributes.This is achieved by analyzing the shape, dimension, color, and otherimaging attributes in the captured scene and generating the modifiedscene with similar imaging attributes. For example, in FIG. 2 the textlines 205, 210, 215 and 220 are slightly skewed, the scene generationengine applies the same skew in creating the highlighted area 305 inFIG. 3. In the second mode, a user has the option to control how a newweb page is presented. Option A is to have the associated web pageappear in the device's native browser. Option B is to have the pagerendered as if it existed in the real world, i.e. same zoom, angle ofview, white point, etc. An example of Option B is shown in FIG. 4. Interms of usability, Option A is the suggested default.

According to one exemplary embodiment, mode 1 is implemented in asimilar fashion as a web browser. Mode 1 creates a table that lists allthe user inputs, the actions the system should take associated withthese actions, and the information needed to take the action. Forexample, all the web links in the page are listed and for each link, itrecords its associated text, and the parallelogram bounding the text. Ifthe text occupies more than one line, multiple parallelograms boundingthe text are recorded. If a pointing finger moves over the textassociated with a link, the system will highlight the text by: 1)finding in the table the parallelogram(s) bounding the text; and 2)changing the text color and background color in the parallelogram(s).

To summarize, an augmented reality method and system for navigatinghardcopies of web pages is provided, which includes:

-   -   Establishing a database of the web pages, including their        control information and text on the page;    -   Capturing an image of the hardcopy of a webpage;    -   Performing segmentation and OCR on the captured image;    -   Searching the database using the OCR results for the segmented        images;    -   Retrieving the information of the web page from the searching        results; and    -   Creating artificial scenes that simulates web navigation        experience using retrieved web information.

FIG. 5 is a flow chart of an exemplary method of navigating a hard copyof a web page as described herein.

Initially 505, a user captures an image of a web page hard copy using acomputer device including an image capturing device, a display and auser interface, the captured image including one or more text stringswhich provide dormant links to other web pages.

Then 510, OCR (optical character recognition) is performed on thecaptured image to produce a text searchable version of the capturedimage.

Then 515, a database is searched for one or more portions of textassociated with the text searchable version of the captured image, thedatabase including text searchable versions of a plurality of electroniccopies of web pages retrieved from one or more web servers including acopy of the web page hard copy. Each text searchable version of theplurality of electronic copies of web pages includes control informationwhich links one or more text strings contained in the plurality ofelectronic copies of web pages to other linked copies of web pages;

Then 520, the control information associated with the captured web pageis retrieved.

Then 525, the computer displays a processed image of the web page hardcopy, the processed image including the retrieved control informationassociated with the web page hard copy and the processed image includesan appearance of one or more text strings associated with the web pagehard copy which are linked to one or more other electronic copies of webpages retrieved from one or more web servers, the appearance indicatingthe one or more text strings are active.

Then 530, a user selects one of the active text strings and the computerdevice displays the electronic copy of the linked web page associatedwith the active text string.

FIG. 6 depicts a block diagram of exemplary internal hardware that maybe used to contain or implement program instructions, such as theprocess steps discussed above in reference to FIG. 5, according toexemplary embodiments. A bus 600 serves as the main information highwayinterconnecting the other illustrated components of the hardware. CPU605 is the central processing unit of the system, performingcalculations and logic operations required to execute a program. CPU605, alone or in conjunction with one or more of the other elementsdisclosed in FIG. 6, is an exemplary processing device, computing deviceor processor as such terms are used within this disclosure. Read onlymemory (ROM) 610 and random access memory (RAM) 615 constitute exemplarymemory devices (i.e., processor-readable non-transitory storage media).

A controller 620 interfaces with one or more optional memory devices 625to the system bus 600. These memory devices 625 may include, forexample, an external or internal DVD drive, a CD ROM drive, a harddrive, flash memory, a USB drive or the like. As indicated previously,these various drives and controllers are optional devices.

Program instructions, software or interactive modules for providing theinterface and performing any querying or analysis associated with one ormore data sets may be stored in the ROM 610 and/or the RAM 615.Optionally, the program instructions may be stored on a tangiblecomputer readable medium such as a compact disk, a digital disk, flashmemory, a memory card, a USB drive, an optical disc storage medium, suchas a Blu-ray™ disc, and/or other non-transitory storage media.

An optional display interface 630 may permit information from the bus600 to be displayed on the display 635 in audio, visual, graphic oralphanumeric format. Communication with external devices, such as aprint device, may occur using various communication ports 640. Anexemplary communication port 640 may be attached to a communicationsnetwork, such as the Internet or an intranet.

The hardware may also include an interface 645 which allows for receiptof data from input devices such as a keyboard 650 or other input device655 such as a mouse, a joystick, a touch screen, a remote control, apointing device, a video input device and/or an audio input device.

Some portions of the detailed description herein are presented in termsof algorithms and symbolic representations of operations on data bitsperformed by conventional computer components, including a centralprocessing unit (CPU), memory storage devices for the CPU, and connecteddisplay devices. These algorithmic descriptions and representations arethe means used by those skilled in the data processing arts to mosteffectively convey the substance of their work to others skilled in theart. An algorithm is generally perceived as a self-consistent sequenceof steps leading to a desired result. The steps are those requiringphysical manipulations of physical quantities. Usually, though notnecessarily, these quantities take the form of electrical or magneticsignals capable of being stored, transferred, combined, compared, andotherwise manipulated. It has proven convenient at times, principallyfor reasons of common usage, to refer to these signals as bits, values,elements, symbols, characters, terms, numbers, or the like.

It should be understood, however, that all of these and similar termsare to be associated with the appropriate physical quantities and aremerely convenient labels applied to these quantities. Unlessspecifically stated otherwise, as apparent from the discussion herein,it is appreciated that throughout the description, discussions utilizingterms such as “processing” or “computing” or “calculating” or“determining” or “displaying” or the like, refer to the action andprocesses of a computer system, or similar electronic computing device,that manipulates and transforms data represented as physical(electronic) quantities within the computer system's registers andmemories into other data similarly represented as physical quantitieswithin the computer system memories or registers or other suchinformation storage, transmission or display devices.

The exemplary embodiment also relates to an apparatus for performing theoperations discussed herein. This apparatus may be specially constructedfor the required purposes, or it may comprise a general-purpose computerselectively activated or reconfigured by a computer program stored inthe computer. Such a computer program may be stored in a computerreadable storage medium, such as, but is not limited to, any type ofdisk including floppy disks, optical disks, CD-ROMs, andmagnetic-optical disks, read-only memories (ROMs), random accessmemories (RAMs), EPROMs, EEPROMs, magnetic or optical cards, or any typeof media suitable for storing electronic instructions, and each coupledto a computer system bus.

The algorithms and displays presented herein are not inherently relatedto any particular computer or other apparatus. Various general-purposesystems may be used with programs in accordance with the teachingsherein, or it may prove convenient to construct more specializedapparatus to perform the methods described herein. The structure for avariety of these systems is apparent from the description above. Inaddition, the exemplary embodiment is not described with reference toany particular programming language. It will be appreciated that avariety of programming languages may be used to implement the teachingsof the exemplary embodiment as described herein.

A machine-readable medium includes any mechanism for storing ortransmitting information in a form readable by a machine (e.g., acomputer). For instance, a machine-readable medium includes read onlymemory (“ROM”); random access memory (“RAM”); magnetic disk storagemedia; optical storage media; flash memory devices; and electrical,optical, acoustical or other form of propagated signals (e.g., carrierwaves, infrared signals, digital signals, etc.), just to mention a fewexamples.

The methods illustrated herein, and described throughout thespecification, may be implemented in a computer program product that maybe executed on a computer. The computer program product may comprise anon-transitory computer-readable recording medium on which a controlprogram is recorded, such as a disk, hard drive, or the like. Commonforms of non-transitory computer-readable media include, for example,floppy disks, flexible disks, hard disks, magnetic tape, or any othermagnetic storage medium, CD-ROM, DVD, or any other optical medium, aRAM, a PROM, an EPROM, a FLASH-EPROM, or other memory chip or cartridge,or any other tangible medium from which a computer can read and use.

It will be appreciated that variants of the above-disclosed and otherfeatures and functions, or alternatives thereof, may be combined intomany other different systems or applications. Various presentlyunforeseen or unanticipated alternatives, modifications, variations orimprovements therein may be subsequently made by those skilled in theart which are also intended to be encompassed by the following claims.

What is claimed is:
 1. A computer-implemented method of navigating ahard copy of a web page comprising: A) capturing an image of aphysically displayed web page hard copy using a mobile hand held imagecapturing device including a camera, a display and a user interface, analignment of the mobile hand held image capturing device and thecaptured image horizontally and/or vertically skewed relative to adisplayed angle of view associated with the physically displayed webpage, and the captured image including one or more text strings whichprovide dormant links to other web pages; B) performing OCR (opticalcharacter recognition) on the captured image to produce a textsearchable version of the captured image; C) searching a database for anelectronic copy of a web page matching the web page hardcopy bysearching the database for one or more portions of text associated withthe text searchable version of the captured image, the databaseincluding text searchable versions of a plurality of electronic copiesof web pages retrieved from one or more web servers including theelectronic a copy of the web page hard copy, each text searchableversion of the plurality of electronic copies of web pages includingcontrol information which links one or more text strings contained inthe plurality of electronic copies of web pages to other linked copiesof web pages; D) identifying the matching electronic copy of the webpage hard copy; E) retrieving the control information associated withthe captured web page hard copy from the matching electronic copy of theweb page hard copy; and F) generating and displaying on the mobilehandheld image capturing device display a processed image of thematching electronic copy of the web page hard copy horizontally andvertically aligned to the display substantially equivalent to thecaptured image alignment horizontally and/or vertically skewed relativeto the displayed angle of view associated with the physically displayedweb page, the processed image including the retrieved controlinformation associated with the matching electronic copy of the web pagehard copy and the processed image including a modified appearance of theone or more text strings associated with the web page hard copy whichare linked to one or more other electronic copies of web pages retrievedfrom the one or more web servers, the modified appearance indicating theone or more text strings are active and the modified appearance of thetext strings at substantially the same angle as the captured imagehorizontally and/or vertically skewed relative to the displayed angle ofview associated with the physically displayed web page.
 2. Thecomputer-implemented method of navigating a hard copy of a web pageaccording to claim 1, further comprising: a user selecting one of theactive text strings and the mobile handheld image capturing devicedisplaying the electronic copy of the linked web page associated withthe active text string.
 3. The computer-implemented method of navigatinga web page hard copy according to claim 1, wherein the mobile hand heldimage capturing device is one of a smart phone, mobile computing device,and laptop computer.
 4. The computer-implemented method of navigating aweb page hard copy according to claim 1, wherein step E) displays theprocessed image of the web page hard copy using a native browserassociated with the mobile hand held image capturing device.
 5. Thecomputer-implemented method of navigating a web page hard copy accordingto claim 1, wherein step E) displays an augmented image including theretrieved control information associated with the matching electroniccopy of web page hard copy, and the augmented image includes an overlayon the captured image which modifies the appearance of one or more textstrings associated with the web page hard copy which are linked to oneor more other electronic copies of web pages retrieved from one or moreweb servers, the modified appearance indicating the one or more textstrings are active.
 6. The computer-implemented method of navigating aweb page hard copy according to claim 1, further comprising: a userselecting one of the active text strings and the mobile hand held imagecapturing device display displaying the electronic copy of the linkedweb page associated with the active text string; and the user selectinga second active text string associated with the electronic copy of thelinked web page and the mobile hand held image capturing device displaydisplaying an electronic copy of the linked web page associated with thesecond active text string.
 7. A web page hard copy navigation systemcomprising: a mobile hand held image capturing device including acamera, a display and a user interface, the mobile hand held imagecapturing device configured to capture an image of a physicallydisplayed web page hard copy containing one or more dormant links toother web pages, an alignment of the mobile hand held image capturingdevice and the captured image horizontally and/or vertically skewedrelative to a displayed angle of view associated with the physicallydisplayed web page; a database operatively connected to the mobile handheld image capturing device, the database configured to store aplurality of web page electronic copies retrieved from one or more webservers, the plurality of web page electronic copies including controlinformation which links text strings contained in the web pageelectronic copies to other web page electronic copies; a serveroperatively connected to the mobile hand held image capturing device andthe database, the server configured to search the database for amatching electronic copy of the captured image of the web page hardcopy, retrieve the electronic copy of the web page hard copy associatedwith the captured image including any control information, andcommunicating the retrieved electronic copy of the web page hard copyassociated with the captured image to the mobile hand held imagecapturing device, the communicated retrieved electronic copy including aprocessed image of the web page hard copy aligned substantiallyequivalent to the captured image alignment which is horizontally and/orvertically skewed relative to the displayed angle of view associatedwith the physically displayed web page, the processed image includingthe retrieved control information associated with the retrievedelectronic copy of the web page hard copy, and the processed imageincluding an overlay on the captured image which modifies an appearanceof one or more text strings associated with the web page hard copy whichare linked to one or more other electronic copies of web pagesindicating the one or more text strings are active.
 8. The web page hardcopy navigation system according to claim 7, wherein the system isconfigured to receive a user selection via the UI indicating a selectionof one of the active text strings and display the electronic copy of thelinked web page associated with the active text string.
 9. The web pagehard copy navigation system according to claim 7, wherein the mobilehand held image capturing device is one of a smart phone, mobilecomputing device, and laptop computer.
 10. The web page hard copynavigation system according to claim 7, wherein the system is configuredto display the processed image of the web page hard copy using a nativebrowser associated with the mobile hand held image capturing device. 11.The web page hard copy navigation system according to claim 7, whereinthe system is configured to display an augmented image including theretrieved control information associated with the web page hard copy,and the augmented image includes an overlay on the captured image whichmodifies an appearance of one or more text strings associated with theweb page hard copy which are linked to one or more other electroniccopies of web pages retrieved from one or more web servers, the modifiedappearance indicating the one or more text strings are active.
 12. Theweb page hard copy navigation system according to claim 7, wherein thesystem is configured to receive a user selection via the user interfaceindicating a selection of one of the active text strings, display theelectronic copy of the linked web page associated with the active textstring, receive a second user selection of a second active text stringassociated with the electronic copy of the linked web page, and displayan electronic copy of the linked web page associated with the secondactive text string.
 13. A computer program product comprising: anon-transitory computer-usable data carrier storing instructions that,when executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform a methodcomprising: A) capturing an image of a physically displayed web pagehard copy using a mobile hand held image capturing device including acamera, a display and a user interface, an alignment of the mobile handheld image capturing device and the captured image horizontally and/orvertically skewed relative to a displayed angle of view associated withthe physically displayed web page, and the captured image including oneor more text strings which provide dormant links to other web pages; B)performing OCR (optical character recognition) on the captured image toproduce a text searchable version of the captured image; C) searching adatabase for an electronic copy of a web page matching the web pagehardcopy by searching the database for one or more portions of textassociated with the text searchable version of the captured image, thedatabase including text searchable versions of a plurality of electroniccopies of web pages retrieved from one or more web servers including theelectronic a copy of the web page hard copy, each text searchableversion of the plurality of electronic copies of web pages includingcontrol information which links one or more text strings contained inthe plurality of electronic copies of web pages to other linked copiesof web pages; identifying the matching electronic copy of the web pagehard copy; E) retrieving the control information associated with thecaptured web page hard copy from the matching electronic copy of the webpage hard copy; and F) generating and displaying on the mobile handheldimage capturing device display a processed image of the matchingelectronic copy of the web page hard copy horizontally and verticallyaligned to the display substantially equivalent to the captured imagealignment horizontally and/or vertically skewed relative to thedisplayed angle of view associated with the physically displayed webpage, the processed image including the retrieved control informationassociated with the matching electronic copy of the web page hard copyand the processed image including a modified appearance of the one ormore text strings associated with the web page hard copy which arelinked to one or more other electronic copies of web pages retrievedfrom the one or more web servers, the modified appearance indicating theone or more text strings are active and the modified appearance of thetext strings at substantially the same angle as the captured imagehorizontally and/or vertically skewed relative to the displayed angle ofview associated with the physically displayed web page.
 14. The computerprogram product according to claim 13, the method further comprising:receiving a user selection of one of the active text strings anddisplaying the electronic copy of the linked web page associated withthe active text string.
 15. The computer program product according toclaim 13, wherein the mobile hand held image capturing device is one ofa smart phone, mobile computing device, and laptop computer.
 16. Thecomputer program product according to claim 13, wherein step E) displaysthe processed image of the web page hard copy using a native browserassociated with the mobile hand held image capturing device.
 17. Thecomputer program product according to claim 13, wherein step E) displaysan augmented image including the retrieved control informationassociated with the matching electronic copy of the web page hard copy,and the augmented image includes an overlay on the captured image whichmodifies the appearance of one or more text strings associated with theweb page hard copy which are linked to one or more other electroniccopies of web pages retrieved from one or more web servers, the modifiedappearance indicating the one or more text strings are active.
 18. Thecomputer program product according to claim 13, the method furthercomprising: a user selecting one of the active text strings and themobile hand held image capturing device display displaying theelectronic copy of the linked web page associated with the active textstring; and the user selecting a second active text string associatedwith the electronic copy of the linked web page and the mobile hand heldimage capturing device display displaying an electronic copy of thelinked web page associated with the second active text string.